This is also known as the "Teddy Bear" process, after a (possibly apocryphal) tale of a college computer center that required all students to explain their problem to the teddy bear on the lab monitor's desk before the lab monitor would listen to them. The tale goes that most of the time, the student would get halfway through their explanation and go "Ohhhh ...", blush, and walk away.

My criteria for good software:

Does it work?

Can someone else come in, make a change, and be reasonably certain no bugs were introduced?